A Little Bit More . . . Page 2

The Community Site For Chester & Newtown

Back Brook Street was located immediately behind, and parallell to, Brook Street. Our family home number 23, happened to be opposite the one last remaining terrace house, number 24, and was a '2-up, 2-down' terraced house, with outside toilet at end of the yard. We had the Chester cattle-market, at the top end of the street, on George Street!
St Oswalds Way now runs almost exactly along the route of what was Back Brook Street, and there are still some surviving buildings which used to form part of the 'bottom end' of the street - notably, as mentioned, number 24 Back Brook Street which you can still see. In addition, the backs of the vegatable and butchers shops, which formed one end of our street, can also still be seen.

Being so close to the cattle market, meant that we got to see, hear and smell, the dozens of large 'Foden' cattle waggons disgorging their angry, noisey, and very smelly occupants which would clatter down the wooden waggon ramp, skating on shit, wide-eyed in terror and skidding into the cattle pens inside the market.

If we children were lucky, a regular occurence was for escapee cattle, (cows, pigs or sheep), to race off up George Street, or dart accross the road into Back Brook Street and, in their terror, barge into peoples homes.

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You can still see the Butchers and veg shop buildings in Brook Street, and the tiny bit of what is left of Back Brook Street here.

This is all that is now left of Back Brook Street. From the white sided building on the right to the white sided building on the left. Looking towards Hoole.

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